OUR SILENT AUCTION AS PART OF THE FOURTEENTH ANNUAL HEARTS IN HARMONY GALA STARTS NOW!

NO NEED TO ATTEND THE GALA IN ORDER TO BE ELIGIBLE TO BID.

Bid on a luxurious five star vacation to Cabo San Lucas … an exquisite painting by Franco Mondini Ruiz … Gift Certificates to Pinky’s, Shetler-Wade & Julian Gold … Dinner at Southerleigh or Paloma Blanca … Prime tickets to cheer on the Spurs or enjoy the SA Stock Show & Rodeo … Just to name a few!

Click the link to browse and bid on Silent Auction items
now until February 26th.

http://cbcst15.auction-bid.org/micro2.php

]]>http://cbcst.org/2015/02/18/let-the-bidding-begin/feed/0Suicide Among the Young — Searching for Answershttp://cbcst.org/2015/01/26/suicide-among-the-young-searching-for-answers/
http://cbcst.org/2015/01/26/suicide-among-the-young-searching-for-answers/#commentsMon, 26 Jan 2015 23:28:42 +0000http://cbcst.org/?p=2081Suicide among the young — searching for answers

Jordan Harris’ suicide spurred her mother to create a foundation.

More than 50 experts meet to seek solutions
By Melissa Fletcher Stoeltje; January 25, 2015

Last spring, a member of the Child Fatality Review Team, which examines child deaths in Bexar County, approached Marian Sokol and asked a concerning question: What might be fueling a spike in the number of youth suicides?

In 2014, nine children under the age of 18 took that most drastic and irreversible of steps — ending their young lives. That was more than twice the number of any given year in recent times, and approached a high point of 12, set in the early ’90s.

Sokol, head of the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas, called two longtime child advocates in San Antonio, asking, “Who is the local leading authority on youth suicide?” They didn’t know. She called her friend Helen Loring Dear, vice president of Porter Loring Mortuaries, and asked the same question.

Dear didn’t know either, but spoke of the emotional pain she’d witnessed in families who’d had to bury young ones lost to suicide.

Together, the two set out to find out the main repository of knowledge about youth suicide in San Antonio, and came to a startling conclusion: There was none. In its place was a hodgepodge of local and state agencies and nonprofits, all working on the problem of youth suicide in their separate silos, usually not communicating across lines, often duplicating efforts.

On Friday, Sokol, Dear and more than 50 representatives from a host of entities — mental health groups, state agencies, school districts, advocate organizations and more — came together to confront youth suicide with one voice and perhaps come up with a coordinated solution.

“I want to see something happen sooner rather than later,” Sokol told those gathered for the first roundtable, which convened in a large conference room at Valero. “Our children can’t wait.”

After a nearly five-hour meeting, the group arrived at a host of possible goals, including reducing the stigma around mental illness and suicide among youth, fostering collaboration between the various groups, and improving access to mental health and substance abuse treatment for families.

Sokol said the wealth of information would be analyzed and summarized, after which the new coalition — headed by the bereavement center, Clarity Child Guidance Center and Voices for Children of San Antonio — would reconvene to plan a course of action.

Dr. Anil T. Mangla, assistant director at Metro Health, peppered the group with alarming statistics from the most recent Youth Risk Behavior Survey, which drove home the urgency of their discussion.

The survey, based on the self-reports of high school students across the U.S. every two years, shows that students in Bexar County are in line with national percentages when it comes to being at risk for considering and attempting suicide.

For example, almost 30 percent of high school students in the county said they struggled with feelings of sadness and hopelessness in the past year, one of the major markers for suicide risk, Mangla said.

“That is dangerous,” he said. “Kids who felt hopeless were seven times more likely to attempt suicide compared to other kids.”

When it came time to talk about solutions, Victoria M. Bustos with the Region 20 Education Service Center suggested taking the survey data to state legislators. School counselors already are overloaded with cases, she said, and plans to saddle them with even more academic-related work will further strain their ability to help troubled students.

“The data will talk,” she said.

The conference began on a personal note when Ellen Harris of North Richland Hills, a suburb of Fort Worth, whose daughter, Jordan, killed herself in 2012 after enduring six months of depression, urged those assembled to battle the shame that surrounds suicide.

“Our most important mission is to bring this conversation to light,” said Harris, co-founder of the Jordan Elizabeth Harris Foundation, a nonprofit that supports research and education on depression and suicide prevention. “People don’t want to talk about this, but most have some sort of personal story about how mental illness or suicide touched their lives.”

mstoeltje@express-news.net

Melissa Fletcher Stoeltje

social services reporter | San Antonio Express-News

MORE INFORMATION
More information

The National Suicide Prevention Hotline Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255.

Visit www.TexasSuicidePrevention.org for local, state and national resources.

We’ve got a busy year ahead with LOTS of fun activities planned and are in need of some supplies!!

Blank Canvases
(sizes 5×7 or 8×10)

Fabric Markers

Paint Pens

8 inch Clay Pots

To see more items needed from our WISH LIST click the image.

]]>http://cbcst.org/2015/01/02/supplies-needed-2/feed/0Baptist Health Foundation of San Antonio heals hearts this Holiday Season.http://cbcst.org/2014/12/16/baptist-health-foundation-of-san-antonio-heals-hearts-this-holiday-season/
http://cbcst.org/2014/12/16/baptist-health-foundation-of-san-antonio-heals-hearts-this-holiday-season/#commentsTue, 16 Dec 2014 18:59:27 +0000http://cbcst.org/?p=2052Baptist Health Foundation of San Antonio heals hearts of grieving children through their charitable giving. SAN ANTONIO (December 2014) – The Children’s Bereavement Center is thrilled to announce a generous gift of $120,000 from the Baptist Health Foundation of San Antonio. This gift will support the Center’s Beyond Sudden Death peer support group which helps children who have lost a parent due to sudden death. Children are able to meet others who have experienced a similar loss and engage in therapeutic activities that incorporate art, writing, music and movement, dance and dramatic play to help process feelings of grief. Peer support groups are open-ended, meet twice a month and are offered at no cost to families. CONTACT: Denise Rizzo 210-736-4847 drizzo@cbcst.org www.cbcst.org
]]>http://cbcst.org/2014/12/16/baptist-health-foundation-of-san-antonio-heals-hearts-this-holiday-season/feed/0Light Fest 2014http://cbcst.org/2014/11/25/light-fest-2014/
http://cbcst.org/2014/11/25/light-fest-2014/#commentsTue, 25 Nov 2014 23:41:00 +0000http://cbcst.org/?p=1965

Join us for a drive-thru spectacular of 2 million lights!

Dates:

12/8 – 12/10

12/15 – 12/17

From: 6 – 9pm

@ Don Strange Ranch (103 Waring Welfare Rd, Boerne, TX)

Admission per vehicle $20

(Print the coupon below and the Center will receive a $5 donation!!)

]]>http://cbcst.org/2014/11/25/light-fest-2014/feed/0OPEN HOUSE: School Counselors & Social Workershttp://cbcst.org/2014/09/11/open-house-school-counselors-social-workers/
http://cbcst.org/2014/09/11/open-house-school-counselors-social-workers/#commentsThu, 11 Sep 2014 16:59:24 +0000http://cbcst.org/?p=1907School counselors and social workers,
Join us for an Open House at the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas. Come take a tour and learn about the Center’s services and professional trainings to help offer more support to grieving children that you work with.

Children use art therapy and other means to help heal from grief at the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas.

SAN ANTONIO — When Martha Atkins founded the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas in 1997, she traveled to churches in San Antonio, the trunk of her car filled with books and materials to help children who struggled with the pain of losing a loved one.

Things have changed dramatically since those early beginnings. Four years ago, the nonprofit moved into a $2.1 million building on the edge of Olmos Park, relocating from Monte Vista, with multiple rooms where children can heal through peer-support groups and a variety of therapies — art, play, music, movement and drama.
One year ago, Marian Sokol was hired as the center’s third executive director. Sokol, who for 21 years served as the head of Any Baby Can, a local nonprofit that serves families with special-needs children, had just returned to San Antonio after a nine-year stint in Washington.

She and the bereavement center board decided to double down on the goal of reaching children across the city.

“We started thinking, ‘What new ways can we connect with other agencies, and reach out to more children?’” she said.

In the last year, the center has seen a 67 percent increase in the number of client visits from the previous year — from 4,900 to 8,200 — the majority of them low-income children and families. Peer-support groups and therapies are offered at no cost; individual counseling is provided for fees based on income and are often waived.

The center added two support groups to handle the overflow, said Blair Thompson, managing director.

Two programs have been created in the last year alone. Camp Heroes is a camp in which kids from all over the city are bused to the center for three days and two nights of healing and fun.

The free camp, which is done in partnership with Communities in Schools of San Antonio, this year enabled 30 boys and girls ages 8 to 11 who’ve experienced grief to spend time expressing their feelings and connecting with peers who understand what it’s like to lose someone important.

Tabatha Ruby’s four children, ages 7 to 15, took part in the first camp, held during Spring Break. Last January, her husband Joshua had died after contracting pneumonia. A teacher at Walzem Elementary School suggested the camp to Ruby.

“They had a blast,” she said of her kids. “They didn’t have to be so serious and got to express themselves in way they can’t in an everyday environment. There were other kids there they could relate to.”

A second camp was held in July. The center plans to hold another in the fall of next year at Camp Tejas in Giddings with a focus on music therapy, said Tami Logsdon, a center counselor. That camp will serve 50 children, she said.

Another new program brought peer support to local high scrisk youth.

The weekly sessions at both schools started in January and lasted 10 to 11 weeks, Ruiz said. The goal was to allow students who’ve endured a loss to open up and process the experience.

Stefanie Banda, a counselor at Healy-Murphy, said those in the all-female group included young women who’d experienced the death of extended family members as well as their own miscarriages.

“Some had never really dealt with the emotion, the pain,” she said. “They were able to learn to express themselves. At the beginning, a lot of the girls didn’t want to talk, but by the end they trusted each other. It was a beautiful process to see.”

]]>http://cbcst.org/2014/09/02/center-sees-60-increase-in-visits/feed/0Viva Fiesta!!http://cbcst.org/2014/04/21/viva-fiesta/
http://cbcst.org/2014/04/21/viva-fiesta/#commentsMon, 21 Apr 2014 16:04:15 +0000http://cbcst.org/?p=1846Thanks to Porter Loring Mortuaries for sponsoring the Center’s float in the 2014 Texas Cavaliers River Parade, which took place on April 21st. For more than 70 years, the Texas Cavaliers have organized this event for visitors and locals of all ages. The Texas Cavaliers’ primary mission is to benefit various children’s charities in Bexar County. This year’s River Parade benefited 45 different children’s charities, one of which being the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas. Thank you to all of the kids who rode on the float for the 2014 River Parade and to the Texas Cavaliers for being a long time supporter of children in Bexar County.